18 BESTSELLING CLASSIC NOVELS IN 1913 - 1914: THE INSIDE OF THE CUP, V.V.'S EYES, LADDIE A TRUE BLUE STORY, THE JUDGMENT HOUSE, THE HEART OF THE HILLS, THE AMATEUR GENTLEMAN, and many more...

The Judgment House

The Judgment House - Scholar's Choice Edition

The Works Of Gilbert Parker: The Judgment House

The Judgment House: The Works of Gilbert Parker

The Judgement House

music-room. "He's in the next room there. I mean to kill him--to killhim--now. I wanted you to know why, to know all, you, Stafford, my oldfriend and hers. And I'm going to do it now. Listen to him there!"

His words came brokenly and scarce above a whisper, but they wereghastly in their determination, in their loathing, their blindfury. He was gone mad, all the animal in him alive, the brain tossingon a sea of disorder.

"Now!" he said, suddenly, and, rising, he pushed back his chair. "Givethat to me."

He reached out his hand for the letter, but his confused senses weresuddenly arrested by the look in Ian Stafford's face, a look sostrange, so poignant, so insistent, that he paused. Words could nothave checked his blind haste like that look. In the interval whichfollowed, the music from the other room struck upon the ears of both,with exasperating insistence:

"Not like the roses shall our love be, dear--"

Stafford made no motion to return the letter. He caught and heldRudyard's eyes.

"You ask me to tell you what I think of the man who wrote thisletter," he said, thickly and slowly, for he was like one paralyzed,regaining his speech with blanching effort: "Byng, I think what youthink--all you think; but I would not do what you want to do."

As he had read the letter the whole horror of the situation burst uponhim. Jasmine had deceived her husband when she turned to himself, andthat was to be understood--to be understood, if not to be pardoned. Awoman might marry, thinking she cared, and all too soon, sometimesbefore the second day had dawned, learn that shrinking and repugnancewhich not even habit can modify or obscure. A girl might be mistaken,with her heart and nature undeveloped, and with that closer intimatelife with another of another sex still untried. With the transitionfrom maidenhood to wifehood, fateful beyond all transitions, yetunmade, she might be mistaken once; as so many have been in therevelations of first intimacy; but not twice, not the second time. Itwas not possible to be mistaken in so vital a thing twice. This wasmerely a wilful, miserable degeneracy. Rudyard had beenwronged--terribly wronged--by himself, by Jasmine; but he had lovedJasmine since she was a child, before Rudyard came--in truth, he allbut possessed her when Rudyard came; and there was some explanation,if no excuse, for that betrayal; but this other, it was incredible, itwas monstrous. It was incredible but yet it was true. Thoughts thatoverturned all his past, that made a melee of his life, rushed andwhirled through his mind as he read the letter with assumeddeliberation when he saw what it was. He read slowly that he mightmake up his mind how to act, what to say and do in this crisis. Todo--what? Jasmine had betrayed him long ago when she had thrown himover for Rudyard, and now she had betrayed him again after she hadmarried Rudyard, and betrayed Rudyard, too; and for whom this secondbetrayal? His heart seemed to shrink to nothingness. This businessdated far beyond yesterday. The letter furnished that sure evidence.

What to do? Like lightning his mind was made up. What to do? Ah, butone thing to do--only one thing to do--save her at any cost, somehowsave her! Whatever she was, whatever she had done, however she hadspoiled his life and destroyed forever his faith, yet he too hadbetrayed this broken man before him, with the look in his eyes of ananimal at bay, ready to do the last irretrievable thing. Even as hershameless treatment of himself smote him; lowered him to that dustwhich is ground from the heels of merciless humanity--even as itsickened his soul beyond recovery in this world, up from the lowestdepths of his being there came the indestructible thing. It was thething that never dies, the love that defies injury, shame, crime,deceit, and desertion, and lives pityingly on, knowing all, enduringall, desiring no touch, no communion, yet prevailing--theindestructible thing.

He knew now in a flash what he had to do. He must save her. He sawthat Rudyard was armed, and that the end might come at anymoment. There was in the wronged husband's eyes the wild, reckless,unseeing thing which disregards consequences, which would rush blindlyon the throne of God itself to snatch its vengeance. He spoke again:and just in time.

"I think what you think, Byng, but I would not do what you want todo. I would do something else."

His voice was strangely quiet, but it had a sharp insistence whichcaused Rudyard to turn back mechanically to the seat he had justleft. Stafford saw the instant's advantage which, if he did notpursue, all would be lost. With a great effort he simulated intenseanger and indignation.

"Sit down, Byng," he said, with a gesture of authority. He leaned overthe table, holding the other's eyes, the letter in one clinchedhand. "Kill him--," he said, and pointed to the other room, from whichcame the maddening iteration of the jingling song--"you would kill himfor his hellish insolence, for this infamous attempt to lead your wifeastray, but what good will it do to kill him?"

"Not him alone, but her too," came the savage, uncontrolled voice fromthe uncontrolled savagery of the soul.

Suddenly a great fear shot up in Stafford's heart. His breath came insharp, breaking gasps. Had he--had he killed Jasmine?

An iron look came into Stafford's face. He had his chance now. Oneword, one defense only! It would do all, or all would be lost--sunk ina sea of tragedy. Diplomacy had taught him the gift of control of faceand gesture, of meaning in tone and word. He made an effort greaterthan he had ever put forward in life. He affected an enormous andscornful surprise.

"You think--you dare to think that she--that Jasmine--"

"Think, you say! The letter--that letter--"

"This letter--this letter, Byng--are you a fool? This letter, thispreposterous thing from the universal philanderer, the effeminateerotic! It is what it is, and it is no more. Jasmine--you knowher. Indiscreet--yes; always indiscreet in her way, in her own way,and always daring. A coquette always. She has coquetted all her life;she cannot help it. She doesn't even know it. She led him on fromsheer wilfulness. What did it matter to her that he was of no account!She led him on, to be at her feet like the rest, like bigger andbetter men--like us all. Was there ever a time when she did not wantto master us? She has coquetted since--ah, you do not know as I do,her old friend! She has coquetted since she was a littlechild. Coquetted, and no more. We have all been her slaves--yes, longbefore you came--all of us. Look at Mennaval! She--"

With a distracted gesture Byng interrupted. "The world believes theworst. Last night, by accident, I heard at De Lancy Scovel's housethat she and Mennaval--and now this--!"

But into the rage, the desperation in the wild eyes, was now creepingan eager look--not of hope, but such a look as might be in eyes thatwere striving to see through darkness, looking for a glimmer of day inthe black hush of morning before the dawn. It was pitiful to see thestrong man tossing on the flood of disordered understanding, a willingcastaway, yet stretching out a hand to be saved.

"Oh, last night, Mennaval, you say, and to-day--this!" Stafford heldup the letter. "This means nothing against her, except indiscretion,and indiscretion which would have been nothing if the man had not beenwhat he is. He is of the slime. He does not matter, except that he hasdared--!"

"He has dared, by God--!"

All Byng's rage came back, the lacerated pride, the offended manhood,the self-esteem which had been spattered by the mud of slander, by thecynical defense, or the pitying solicitude of his friends--of De LancyScovel, Barry Whalen, Sobieski the Polish Jew, Fleming, Wolff, and therest. The pity of these for him--for Rudyard Byng, because the flowerin his garden, his Jasmine-flower, was swept by the blast of calumny!He sprang from his chair with an ugly oath.

But Stafford stepped in front of him. "Sit down, Byng, or damnyourself forever. If she is innocent--and she is--do you think shewould ever live with you again, after you had dragged her name intothe dust of the criminal courts and through the reek of the ha'pennypress? Do you think Jasmine would ever forgive you for suspecting her?If you want to drive her from you forever, then kill him, and go andtell her that you suspect her. I know her--I have known her all herlife, long before you came. I care what becomes of her. She has manywho care what becomes of her--her father, her brother, many men, andmany women who have seen her grow up without a mother. They understandher, they believe in her, because they have known her over all theyears. They know her better than you. Perhaps they care for her--perhaps any one of them cares for her far more than you do."

Now there came a new look into the big, staring eyes. Byng was as onefascinated; light was breaking in on his rage, his besmirched pride,his vengeance; hope was stealing tremblingly into his face.

"She was more to me than all the world--than twenty worlds. She--"

He hesitated, then his voice broke and his body suddenly shookviolently, as tears rose in the far, deep wells of feeling and triedto reach the fevered eyes. He leaned his head in his big, awkwardhands.

Stafford saw the way of escape for Jasmine slowly open out, and wenton quickly. "You have neglected her "--Rudyard's head came up in angryprotest--"not wilfully; but you have neglected her. You have been tooeasy. You should lead, not follow, where a woman is concerned. Allwomen are indiscreet, all are a little dishonourable on opportunity;but not in the big way, only in the small, contemptible way, accordingto our code. We men are dishonourable in the big way where they areconcerned. You have neglected her, Byng, because you have not said,'This way, Jasmine. Come with me. I want you; and you must came, andcome now.' She wanted your society, wanted you all the time; but whileyou did not have her on the leash she went playing--playing. That isit, and that is all. And now, if you want to keep her, if you want herto live on with you, I warn you not to tell her you know of the insultthis letter contains, nor ever say what would make her think yoususpected her. If you do, you will bid good-bye to her forever. Shehas bold blood in her veins, rash blood. Her grandfather--"

"She would resent your suspicion. She, then, would do the mad thing,not you. She would be as frenzied as you were a moment ago; and shewould not listen to reason. If you dared to hint outside in the world,that you believed her guilty, there are some of her old friends whowould feel like doing to you what you want to do to that libertine inthere, to Al'mah's lover--"

"Good God, Stafford--wait!"

"I don't mean Barry Whalen, Fleming, De Lancy Scovel, and therest. They are not her old friends, and they weren't yours once--thatbreed; but the others who are the best, of whom you come, over therein Herefordshire, in Dorset, in Westmorland, where your and her peoplelived, and mine. You have been too long among the Outlanders,Byng. Come back, and bring Jasmine with you. And as for this letter--"

Byng reached out his hand for it.

"No, it contains an insult to your wife. If you get it into yourhands, you will read it again, and then you will do some foolishthing, for you have lost grip of yourself. Here is the only place forsuch stuff--an outburst of sensuality!"

He threw the letter suddenly into the fire. Rudyard sprang to his feetas though to reclaim it, but stood still bewildered, as he sawStafford push it farther into the coals.

Silent, they watched shrivel such evidence as brings ruin upon men andwomen in courts of law.

"Leave the whole thing--leave Fellowes to me," Stafford said, after aslight pause. "I will deal with him. He shall leave the countryto-night. I will see to that. He shall go for three years at least. Donot see him. You will not contain yourself, and for your own chance ofhappiness with the woman you love, you must do nothing, nothing at allnow."

"He has keys, papers--"

"I will see to that; I will see to everything. Now go, at once. Thereis enough for you to do. The war, Oom Paul's war, will be on us today. Do you hear, Byng--to-day! And you have work to do for this yournative country and for South Africa, your adopted country. England andthe Transvaal will be at each other's throat before night. You havework to do. Do it. You are needed. Go, and leave this wretchedbusiness in my hands. I will deal with Fellowes--adequately."

The rage had faded from Byng's fevered eyes, and now there was amoisture in them, a look of incalculable relief. To believe inJasmine, that was everything to him. He had not seen her yet, notsince he left the white rose on her pillow last night--AdrianFellowes' tribute; and after he had read the letter, he had had nowish to see her till he had had his will and done away with Fellowesforever. Then he would see her--for the last time: and she should die,too,--with himself. That had been his purpose. Now all was changed. Hewould not see her now, not till Fellowes was gone forever. Then hewould come again, and say no word which would let her think he knewwhat Fellowes had written. Yes, Stafford was right. She must not know,and they must start again, begin life again together, a newunderstanding in his heart, new purposes in their existence. In thesefew minutes Stafford had taught him much, had showed him where he hadbeen wrong, had revealed to him Jasmine's nature as he never reallyunderstood it.

At the door, as Stafford helped him on with a light overcoat, he tooka revolver from his pocket.

"That's the proof of what I meant to do," he said; "and this is proofof what I mean to do," he added, as he handed over the revolver andStafford's fingers grasped it with a nervous force which hemisinterpreted.

"Ah yes," he exclaimed, sadly, "you don't quite trust me yet--notquite, Stafford; and I don't wonder; but it's all right.... You'vebeen a good, good friend to us both," he added. "I wish Jasmine mightknow how good a friend you've been. But never mind. We'll pay the debtsometime, somehow, she and I. When shall I see you again?"

At that moment a clear voice rang out cheerily in thedistance. "Rudyard--where are you, Ruddy?" it called.

A light broke over Byng's haggard face. "Not yet?" he asked Stafford.

"No, not yet," was the reply, and Byng was pushed through the opendoor into the street.

"Ruddy--where are you, Ruddy?" sang the voice like a morning song.

Then there was silence, save for the music in the room beyond thelittle room where the two men had sat a few moments ago.

The music was still poured forth, but the tune was changed. Now it was"Pagliacci"--that wonderful passage where the injured husband poursout his soul in agony.

Stafford closed the doors of the little room where he and Byng hadsat, and stood an instant listening to the music. He shuddered as thepassionate notes swept over his senses. In this music was the note ofthe character of the man who played--sensuous emotion, sensualdelight. There are men who by nature are as the daughters of thenight, primary prostitutes, with no minds, no moral sense; only asensuous organization which has a gift of shallow beauty, while thelife is never deep enough for tears nor high enough for real joy.

In Stafford's pocket was the revolver which Byng had given him. Hetook it out, and as he did so, a flush swept over his face, and everynerve of his body tingled.

"That way out?" he thought. "How easy--and how selfish.... If one'slife only concerned oneself.... But it's only partly one's own fromfirst to last." . . . Then his thoughts turned again to the man whowas playing "Pagliacci." "I have a greater right to do it than Byng,and I'd have a greater joy in doing it; but whatever he is, it is notall his fault." Again he shuddered. "No man makes love like that to awoman unless she lets him, . . . until she lets him." Then he lookedat the fire where the cruel testimony had shrivelled into smoke. "Ifit had been read to a jury . . . Ah, my God! How many he must havewritten her like that ... How often...."

With an effort he pulled himself together. "What does it matter now!All things have come to an end for me. There is only one way. Myletter to her showed it. But this must be settled first. Then to seeher for the last time, to make her understand...."

He went to the beaded curtain, raised it, and stepped into the floodof warm sunlight. The voluptuous, agonizing music came in a wave overhim. Tragedy, poignant misery, rang through every note, swelled in astream which drowned the senses. This man-devil could play, Staffordremarked, cynically, to himself.

"A moment--Fellowes," he said, sharply.

The music frayed into a discord and stopped.

CHAPTER XXI

THE BURNING FIERY FURNACE

There was that in Stafford's tone which made Fellowes turn with astart. It was to this room that Fellowes had begged Jasmine to comethis morning, in the letter which Krool had so carefully placed forhis master to find, after having read it himself with minutescrutiny. It was in this room they had met so often in those days whenRudyard was in South Africa, and where music had been the medium of anintimacy which had nothing for its warrant save eternal vanity andcuriosity, the evil genius of the race of women. Here it was thatKrool's antipathy to Jasmine and fierce hatred of Fellowes had beennurtured. Krool had haunted the room, desiring the end of it all; buthe had been disarmed by a smiling kindness on Jasmine's part, whichshook his purpose again and again.

It had all been a problem which Krool's furtive mind failed tomaster. If he went to the Baas with his suspicions, the chance wasthat he would be flayed with a sjambok and turned into the streets; ifhe warned Jasmine, the same thing might happen, or worse. But fate hadat last played into his hands, on the very day that Oom Paul hadchallenged destiny, when all things were ready for the ruin of thehated English.

Fate had sent him through the hallway between Jasmine's and Rudyard'srooms in the moment when Jasmine had dropped Fellowes' letter; and hehad seen it fall. He knew not what it was, but it might be ofimportance, for he had seen Fellowes' handwriting on an envelope amongthose waiting for Jasmine's return home. In a far dark corner he hadwaited till he saw Lablanche enter her mistress' room hurriedly,without observing the letter. Then he caught it up and stole away tothe library, where he read it with malevolent eyes.

He had left this fateful letter where Rudyard would see it when herose in the morning. All had worked out as he had planned, and now,with his ear against the door which led from the music-room, hestrained to hear what passed between Stafford and Fellowes.

"Well, what is it?" asked Fellowes, with an attempt to be casual,though there was that in Stafford's face which gave him anxiety, heknew not why. He had expected Jasmine, and, instead, here wasStafford, who had been so much with her of late; who, with Mennaval,had occupied so much of her time that she had scarcely spoken to him,and, when she did so, it was with a detachment which excluded him fromintimate consideration.

His face wore a mechanical smile, as his pale blue eyes met the darkintensity of Stafford's. But slowly the peach-bloom of his cheeksfaded and his long, tapering fingers played nervously with theleather-trimming of the piano-stool.

"Anything I can do for you, Stafford?" he added, with attemptednonchalance.

"There is nothing you can do for me," was the meaning reply, "butthere is something you can do advantageously for yourself, if you willthink it worth while."

"Most of us are ready to do ourselves good turns. What am I to do?"

"You will wish to avoid it, and yet you will do yourself a good turnin not avoiding it."

"Is that the way you talk in diplomatic circles--cryptic, they callit, don't they?"

Stafford's chin hardened, and a look of repulsion and disdain crossedover his face.

"It is more cryptic, I confess, than the letter which will cause youto do yourself a good turn."

Now Fellowes' face turned white. "What letter?" he asked, in a sharp,querulous voice.

"The letter you wrote Mrs. Byng from the Trafalgar Club yesterday."

Fellowes made a feint, an attempt at bravado. "What business is it ofyours, anyhow? What rights have you got in Mrs. Byng's letters?"

"Only what I get from a higher authority."

"Are you in sweet spiritual partnership with the Trinity?"

"The higher authority I mean is Mr. Byng. Let us have no tricks withwords, you fool."

Fellowes made an ineffective attempt at self-possession.

"What the devil . . . why should I listen to you?" There was a peevishstubbornness in the tone.

"Why should you listen to me? Well, because I have saved yourlife. That should be sufficient reason for you to listen."

"Damnation--speak out, if you've got anything to say! I don't see whatyou mean, and you are damned officious. Yes, that's it--damnedofficious." The peevishness was becoming insolent recklessness.

Slowly Stafford drew from his pocket the revolver Rudyard had givenhim. As Fellowes caught sight of the glittering steel he fell backagainst the piano-stool, making a clatter, his face livid.

Stafford's lips curled with contempt. "Don't squirm so, Fellowes. I'mnot going to use it. But Mr. Byng had it, and he was going to useit. He was on his way to do it when I appeared. I stopped him . . . Iwill tell you how. I endeavoured to make him believe that she wasabsolutely innocent, that you had only been an insufferably insolent,presumptuous, and lecherous cad--which is true. I said that, thoughyou deserved shooting, it would only bring scandal to Rudyard Byng'shonourable wife, who had been insulted by the lover of Al'mah and thewould-be betrayer of an honest girl--of Jigger's sister.... Yes, youmay well start. I know of what stuff you are, how you had the soul andbody of one of the most credulous and wonderful women in the world inyour hands, and you went scavenging. From Al'mah to the flower-girl!. . . I think I should like to kill you myself for what you tried todo to Jigger's sister; and if it wasn't here"--he handled the littlesteel weapon with an eager fondness--" I think I'd do it. You are apest."

Cowed, shivering, abject, Fellowes nervously fell back. His bodycrashed upon the keys of the piano, producing a hideousdiscord. Startled, he sprang aside and with trembling hands madegestures of appeal.

"Don't--don't! Can't you see I'm willing! What is it you want me todo? I'll do it. Put it away.... Oh, my God--Oh!" His bloodless lipswere drawn over his teeth in a grimace of terror.

With an exclamation of contempt Stafford put the weapon back into hispocket again. "Pull yourself together," he said. "Your life is safefor the moment; but I can say no more than that. After I had provedthe lady's innocence--you understand, after I had proved the lady'sinnocence to him--"

"Yes, I understand," came the hoarse reply.

"After that, I said I would deal with you; that he could not betrusted to do so. I said that you would leave England withintwenty-four hours, and that you would not return within threeyears. That was my pledge. You are prepared to fulfil it?"

"To leave England! It is impossible--"

"Perhaps to leave it permanently, and not by the English Channel,either, might be worse," was the cold, savage reply. "Mr. Byng madehis terms."

Fellowes shivered. "What am I to do out of England--but, yes, I'll go,I'll go," he added, as he saw the look in Stafford's face and thoughtof the revolver so near to Stafford's hand.

"Yes, of course you will go," was the stern retort. "You will go, justas I say."

"What shall I do abroad?" wailed the weak voice.

"What you have always done here, I suppose--live on others," was thecrushing reply. "The venue will be changed, but you won't change, notyou. If I were you, I'd try and not meet Jigger before you go. Hedoesn't know quite what it is, but he knows enough to make himreckless."

Fellowes moved towards the door in a stumbling kind of way. "I havesome things up-stairs," he said.

"They will be sent after you to your chambers. Give me the keys to thedesk in the secretary's room."

"I'll go myself, and--"

"You will leave this house at once, and everything will be sent afteryou--everything. Have no fear. I will send them myself, and yourletters and private papers will not be read.... You feel you can relyon me for that--eh?"

"Yes . . . I'll go now . . . abroad . . . where?"

"Where you please outside the United Kingdom."

Fellowes passed heavily out through the other room, where his letterhad been read by Stafford, where his fate had been decided. He put onhis overcoat nervously and went to the outer door.

Stafford came up to him again. "You understand, there must be noattempt to communicate here.... You will observe this?"

Fellowes nodded. "Yes, I will.... Good-night," he added, absently.

"Good-day," answered Stafford, mechanically.

The outer door shut, and Stafford turned again to the little roomwhere so much had happened which must change so many lives, bring somany tears, divert so many streams of life.

How still the house seemed now! It had lost all its charm andhomelikeness. He felt stifled. Yet there was the warm sun streamingthrough the doorway of the music-room, making the beaded curtainsshine like gold.

As he stood in the doorway of the little morning-room, looking in withbitter reflection and dreading beyond words what now must come--hismeeting with Jasmine, the story he must tell her, and the exposure ofa truth so naked that his nature revolted from it, he heard a footstepbehind him. It was Krool.

Stafford looked at the saturnine face and wondered how much he knew;but there was no glimmer of revelation in Krool's impassive look. Theeyes were always painful in their deep animal-like glow, and theyseemed more than usually intense this morning; that was all.

"Will you present my compliments to Mrs. Byng, and say--"

Krool, with a gesture, stopped him.

"Mrs. Byng is come now," he said, making a gesture towards thestaircase. Then he stole away towards the servants' quarters of thehouse. His work had been well done, of its kind, and he could nowawait consequences.

Stafford turned to the staircase and saw--in blue, in the oldsentimental blue--Jasmine slowly descending, a strange look ofapprehension in her face.

Immediately after calling out for Rudyard a little while before, shehad discovered the loss of Adrian Fellowes' letter. Hours before thisshe had read and re-read Ian's letter, that document of pain andpurpose, of tragical, inglorious, fatal purpose. She was suddenlyconscious of an air of impending catastrophe about her now. Or was itthat the catastrophe had come? She had not asked for Adrian Fellowes'letter, for if any servant had found it, and had not returned it, itwas useless asking; and if Rudyard had found it--if Rudyard had foundit . . . !

Where was Rudyard? Why had he not come to her, Why had he not eatenthe breakfast which still lay untouched on the table of his study?Where was Rudyard?

Ian's eyes looked straight into hers as she came down the staircase,and there was that in them which paralyzed her. But she made an effortto ignore the apprehension which filled her soul.

"Good-morning. Am I so very late?" she said, gaily, to him, thoughthere was a hollow note in her voice.

"You are just in time," he answered in an even tone which toldnothing.

"Dear me, what a gloomy face! What has happened? What is it? Thereseems to be a Cassandra atmosphere about the place--and so early inthe day, too."

"It is full noon--and past," he said, with acute meaning, as herdaintily shod feet met the floor of the hallway and glided towardshim. How often he had admired that pretty flitting of her feet!

As he looked at her he was conscious, with a new force, of the wonderof that hair on a little head as queenly as ever was given to themodern world. And her face, albeit pale, and with a strangetremulousness in it now, was like that of some fairy dame painted byGreuze. All last night's agony was gone from the rare blue eyes, whoselashes drooped so ravishingly betimes, though that droop was not thereas she looked at Ian now.

She beat a foot nervously on the floor. "What is it--why thisEuripidean air in my simple home? There's something wrong, I see. Whatis it? Come, what is it, Ian?"

Hesitatingly she laid a hand upon his arm, but there was noloving-kindness in his look. The arms which yesterday--onlyyesterday--had clasped her passionately and hungrily to his breast nowhung inert at his side. His eyes were strange and hard.

"Will you come in here," he said, in an arid voice, and held wide thedoor of the room where he and Rudyard had settled the first chapter ofthe future and closed the book of the past.

She entered with hesitating step. Then he shut the door with anaccentuated softness, and came to the table where he had sat withRudyard. Mechanically she took the seat which Rudyard had occupied,and looked at him across the table with a dread conviction stealingover her face, robbing it of every vestige of its heavenly colour,giving her eyes a staring and solicitous look.

"Well, what is it? Can't you speak and have it over?" she asked, withdesperate impatience.

"Fellowes' letter to you--Rudyard found it," he said, abruptly.

She fell back as though she had been struck, then recoveredherself. "You read it?" she gasped.

"Rudyard made me read it. I came in when he was just about to killFellowes."

She gave a short, sharp cry, which with a spasm of determination herfingers stopped.

"Kill him--why?" she asked in a weak voice, looking down at hertrembling hands which lay clasped on the table before her.

"The letter--Fellowes' letter to you."

"I dropped it last night," she said, in a voice grown strangelyimpersonal and colourless. "I dropped it in Rudyard's room, Isuppose."

She seemed not to have any idea of excluding the terrible facts, butto be speaking as it were to herself and of something not vital,though her whole person was transformed into an agony which congealedthe lifeblood.

Her voice sounded tuneless and ragged. "He read it--Rudyard read aletter which was not addressed to him! He read a letter addressed tome--he read my letter.... It gave me no chance."

"No chance--?"

A bitter indignation was added to the cheerless discord of hertones. "Yes, I had a chance, a last chance--if he had not read theletter. But now, there is no chance.... You read it, too. You read theletter which was addressed to me. No matter what it was--my letter,you read it."

"Rudyard said to me in his terrible agitation, 'Read that letter, andthen tell me what you think of the man who wrote it.' . . . I thoughtit was the letter I wrote to you, the letter I posted to you lastnight. I thought it was my letter to you."

Her eyes had a sudden absent look. It was as though she were speakingin a trance. "I answered that letter--your letter. I answered it thismorning. Here is the answer . . . here." She laid a letter on thetable before him, then drew it back again into her lap. "Now it doesnot matter. But it gives me no chance...."

There was a world of despair and remorse in her voice. Her face waswan and strained. "No chance, no chance," she whispered.

"Rudyard did not kill him?" she asked, slowly and cheerlessly, after amoment, as though repeating a lesson. "Why?"

"I stopped him. I prevented him."

"You prevented him--why?" Her eyes had a look of unutterable confusionand trouble. "Why did you prevent it--you?"

"That would have hurt you--the scandal, the grimy press, the world."

Her voice was tuneless, and yet it had a strange, piteouspoignancy. "It would have hurt me--yes. Why did you not want to hurtme?"

He did not answer. His hands had gone into his pockets, as though tosteady their wild nervousness, and one had grasped the little weaponof steel which Rudyard had given him. It produced some strange,malignant effect on his mind. Everything seemed to stop in him, and hewas suddenly possessed by a spirit which carried him into that sameregion where Rudyard had been. It was the region of the abnormal. Init one moves in a dream, majestically unresponsive to all outwardthings, numb, unconcerned, disregarding all except one's own agony,which seems to neutralize the universe and reduce all life's problemsto one formula of solution.

"What did you say to him that stopped him?" she asked in a whisper ofawed and dreadful interest, as, after an earthquake, a survivor wouldspeak in the stillness of dead and unburied millions.

"I said the one thing to say," he answered after a moment,involuntarily laying the pistol on the table before him--doing it, asit were, without conscious knowledge.

It fascinated Jasmine, the ugly, deadly little vehicle ofoblivion. Her eyes fastened on it, and for an instant stared at ittransfixed; then she recovered herself and spoke again.

"What was the one thing to say?" she whispered.

"That you were innocent--absolutely, that--"

Suddenly she burst into wild laughter--shrill, acrid, cheerless,hysterical, her face turned upward, her hands clasped under her chin,her body shaking with what was not laughter, but the terrifyingagitation of a broken organism.

He waited till she had recovered somewhat, and then he repeated hiswords.

"I said that you were innocent absolutely; that Fellowes' letter wasthe insolence and madness of a voluptuary, that you had only beenwilful and indiscreet, and that--"

In a low, mechanical tone from which was absent any agitation, he toldher all he had said to Rudyard, and what Rudyard had said tohim. Every word had been burned into his brain, and nearly every wordwas now repeated, while she sat silent, looking at her hands claspedon the table before her. When he came to the point where Rudyard wentfrom the house, leaving Stafford to deal with Fellowes, she burstagain into laughter, mocking, wilful, painful.

"You were left to set things right, to be the lord highexecutioner--you, Ian!"

How strange his name sounded on her lips now--foreign, distant,revealing the nature of the situation more vividly than all the wordswhich had been said, than all that had been done.

"Rudyard did not think of killing you, I suppose," she went on,presently, with a bitter motion of the lips, and a sardonic notecreeping into the voice.

"No, I thought of that," he answered, quietly, "as you know." His eyessought the weapon on the table involuntarily. "That would have beeneasy enough," he added. "I was not thinking of myself, or of Fellowes,but only of you--and Rudyard."

"Only of me--and Rudyard," she repeated with drooping eyes, whichsuddenly became alive again with feeling and passion andwildness. "Wasn't it rather late for that?"

The words stung him beyond endurance. He rose and leaned across thetable towards her.

"At least I recognized what I had done, what you had done, and I triedto face it. I did not disguise it. My letter to you proves that. Butnevertheless I was true to you. I did not deceive you--ever. I lovedyou--ah, I loved you as few women have been loved! . . . But you, youmight have made a mistake where Rudyard was concerned, made themistake once, but if you wronged him, you wronged me infinitelymore. I was ready to give up all, throw all my life, my career, to thewinds, and prove myself loyal to that which was more than all; or Iwas willing to eliminate myself from the scene forever. I was willingto pay the price--any price--just to stand by what was the biggestthing in my life. But you were true to nothing--to nothing--tonobody."

"If one is untrue--once, why be true at all ever?" she said with anaching laugh, through which tears ran, though none dropped from hereyes. "If one is untrue to one, why not to a thousand?"

Again a mocking laugh burst from her. "Don't you see? One kiss, awrong? Why not, then, a thousand kisses! The wrong came in the momentthat the one kiss was given. It is the one that kills, not thethousand after."

There came to her mind again--and now with what sardonicforce--Rudyard's words that day before they went to Glencader: "If youhad lived a thousand years ago you would have had a thousand lovers."

"And so it is all understood between you and Rudyard," she added,mechanically. "That is what you have arranged for me--that I go onliving as before with Rudyard, while I am not to know from himanything has happened; but to accept what has been arranged for me,and to be repentant and good and live in sackcloth. It has beenarranged, has it, that Rudyard is to believe in me?"

"That has not been arranged."

"It has been arranged that I am to live with him as before, and thathe is to pretend to love me as before, and--"

"He does love you as before. He has never changed. He believed in you,was so pitifully eager to believe in you even when the letter--"

"Where is the letter?"

He pointed to the fire.

"Who put it in the fire?" she asked. "You?"

He inclined his head.

"Ah yes, always so clever! A burst of indignation at his daring tosuspect me even for an instant, and with a flourish into the fire, theevidence. Here is yours--your letter. Would you like to put it intothe fire also?" she asked, and drew his letter from the folds of herdress.

"But, no, no, no--" She suddenly sprang to her feet, and her eyes hada look of agonized agitation. "When I have learned every word byheart, I will burn it myself--for your sake." Her voice grew softer,something less discordant came into it. "You will neverunderstand. You could never understand me, or that letter of AdrianFellowes to me, and that he could dare to write me such a letter. Youcould never understand it. But I understand you. I understand yourletter. It came while I was--while I was broken. It healed me,Ian. Last night I wanted to kill myself. Never mind why. You would notunderstand. You are too good to understand. All night I was intorture, and then this letter of yours--it was a revelation. I did notthink that a man lived like you, so true, so kind, so mad. And so Iwrote you a letter, ah, a letter from my soul! and then came down tothis--the end of all. The end of everything--forever."

"No, the beginning if you will have it so.... Rudyard loves you . . ."

She gave a cry of agony. "For God's sake--oh, for God's sake, hush!. . . You think that now I could . . ."

"Begin again with new purpose."

"Purpose! Oh, you fool! You fool! You fool--you who are so wisesometimes! You want me to begin again with Rudyard: and you do notwant me to begin again--with you?"

He was silent, and he looked her in the eyes steadily.

"You do not want me to begin again with you, because you believeme--because you believed the worst from that letter, from AdrianFellowes' letter.... You believed, yet you hypnotized Rudyard into notbelieving. But did you, after all? Was it not that he loves me, andthat he wanted to be deceived, wanted to be forced to do what he hasdone? I know him better than you. But you are right, he would havespoken to me about it if you had not warned him."

"Then begin again--"

"You do not want me any more." The voice had an anguish like the cryof the tragic music in "Elektra." "You do not want what you wantedyesterday--for us together to face it all, Ian. You do not want it?You hate me."

His face was disturbed by emotion, and he did not speak for a moment.

In that moment she became transformed. With a sudden tragic motion shecaught the pistol from the table and raised it, but he wrenched itfrom her hand.

"Do you think that would mend anything?" he asked, with a new pity inhis heart for her." That would only hurt those who have been hurtenough already. Be a little magnanimous. Do not be selfish. Giveothers a chance."

"You were going to do it as an act of unselfishness," she moaned."You were going to die in order to mend it all. Did you think of me inthat? Did you think I would or could consent to that? You believed inme, of course, when you wrote it. But did you think that wasmagnanimous--when you had got a woman's love, then to kill yourself inorder to cure her? Oh, how little you know! . . . But you do not wantme now. You do not believe in me now. You abhor me. Yet if that letterhad not fallen into Rudyard's hands we might perhaps have now been onour way to begin life again together. Does that look as though therewas some one else that mattered--that mattered?"

He held himself together with all his power and will. "There is oneway, and only one way," he said, firmly. "Rudyard loves you. Beginagain with him." His voice became lower. "You know the emptiness ofyour home. There is a way to make some recompense to him. You can payyour debt. Give him what he wants so much. It would be a link. Itwould bind you. A child . . ."

"Oh, how you loathe me!" she said, shudderingly. "Yesterday--and now. . . No, no, no," she added, " I will not, cannot live withRudyard. I cannot wrench myself from one world into another likethat. I will not live with him any more.... There--listen."

Outside the newsboys were calling:

"Extra speshul! Extra speshul! All about the war! War declared! Extraspeshul!"

"War! That will separate many," she added. "It will separate Rudyardand me.... No, no, there will be no more scandal.... But it is the wayof escape--the war."

"The way of escape for us all, perhaps," he answered, with a light ofdetermination in his eyes. "Good-bye," he added, after a slightpause. "There is nothing more to say."

He turned to go, but he did not hold out his hand, nor even look ather.

"Tell me," she said, in a strange, cold tone, "tell me, did AdrianFellowes--did he protect me? Did he stand up for me? Did he defendme?"

"He was concerned only for himself," Ian answered, hesitatingly.

Her face hardened. Pitiful, haggard lines had come into it in the lasthalf-hour, and they deepened still more.

"He did not say one word to put me right?"

Ian shook his head in negation. "What did you expect?" he said.

She sank into a chair, and a strange cruelty came into her eyes,something so hard that it looked grotesque in the beautiful setting ofher pain-worn, exquisite face.

So utter was her dejection that he came back from the door and bentover her.

"Jasmine," he said, gently, "we have to start again, you and I--indifferent paths. They will never meet. But at the end of theroad--peace. Peace the best thing of all. Let us try and find it,Jasmine."

"He did not try to protect me. He did not defend me," she kept sayingto herself, and was only half conscious of what Ian said to her.

He touched her shoulder. "Nothing can set things right between you andme, Jasmine," he added, unsteadily, "but there's Rudyard--you musthelp him through. He heard scandal about Mennaval last night at DeLancy Scovel's. He didn't believe it. It rests with you to give it allthe lie.... Good-bye."

In a moment he was gone. As the door closed she sprang to herfeet. "Ian--Ian--come back," she cried. "Ian, one word--one word."

But the door did not open again. For a moment she stood like onetransfixed, staring at the place whence he had vanished, then, with amoan, she sank in a heap on the floor, and rocked to and fro like onedemented.

Once the door opened quietly, and Krool's face showed, sinister andfurtive, but she did not see it, and the door closed again softly.

At last the paroxysms passed, and a haggard face looked out into theworld of life and being with eyes which were drowned in misery.

"He did not defend me--the coward!" she murmured; then she rose with asudden effort, swayed, steadied herself, and arranged her hair in themirror over the mantelpiece. "The low coward!" she said again. "Butbefore he leaves . . . before he leaves England . . . "

As she turned to go from the room, Rudyard's portrait on the wall mether eyes. "I can't go on, Rudyard," she said to it. "I know that now."

Out in the streets, which Ian Stafford travelled with hasty steps, thenewsboys were calling:

"War declared! All about the war!"

"That is the way out for me," Stafford said, aloud, as he hastenedon. "That opens up the road.... I'm still an artillery officer."

He directed his swift steps toward Pall Mall and the War Office.

CHAPTER XXII

IN WHICH FELLOWES GOES A JOURNEY

Kruger's ultimatum, expected though it was, shook England as nothinghad done since the Indian mutiny, but the tremour of nationalexcitement presently gave way to a quiet, deep determination.

An almost Oriental luxury had gone far to weaken the fibre of thatstrong and opulent middle-class who had been the backbone of England,the entrenched Philistines. The value of birth as a moral asset whichhad a national duty and a national influence, and the value of moneywhich had a social responsibility and a communal use, were unrealizedby the many nouveaux riches who frequented the fashionable purlieus;who gave vast parties where display and extravagance were theprincipal feature; who ostentatiously offered large sums to publicobjects. Men who had made their money where copper or gold or oil orwool or silver or cattle or railways made commercial kings, supportedschemes for the public welfare brought them by fine ladies, largelybecause the ladies were fine; and they gave substantial sums--uponoccasion--for these fine ladies' fine causes. Rich men, or reputedrich men, whose wives never appeared, who were kept in secludedquarters in Bloomsbury or Maida Vale, gave dinners at the Savoy or theCarlton which the scrapings of the aristocracy attended; but thesegave no dinners in return.

To get money to do things, no matter how,--or little matter how; tobe in the swim, and that swim all too rapidly washing out the realpeople--that was the almost universal ambition. But still the realpeople, however few or many, in the time of trouble came quietlyinto the necessary and appointed places with the automaticprecision of the disciplined friend of the state and of humanity;and behind them were folk of the humbler sort, the lower middle-class, the labouring-man. Of these were the landpoor peer, with hissense of responsibility cultivated by daily life and duty in hiscounty, on the one hand; the professional man of all professions,the little merchant, the sailor, the clerk and artisan, the diggerand delver, on the other; and, in between, those people in theshires who had not yet come to be material and gross, who hadold-fashioned ideas of the duty of the citizen and the Christian.In the day of darkness these came and laid what they had at thefoot of the altar of sacrifice.

This at least the war did: it served as a sieve to sift the people,and it served as the solvent of many a life-problem.

Ian Stafford was among the first to whom it offered "the way out," whowent to it for the solution of their own set problem. Suddenly, as hestood with Jasmine in the little room where so many lives were tossedinto the crucible of Fate that morning, the newsboy's voice shouting,"War declared!" had told him the path he must tread.

He had astonished the War Office by his request to be sent to theFront with his old arm, the artillery, and he was himself astonishedby the instant assent that was given. And now on this October day hewas on his way to do two things--to see whether Adrian Fellowes waskeeping his promise, and to visit Jigger and his sister.

There had not been a week since the days at Glencader when he had notgone to the sordid quarters in the Mile End Road to see Jigger, and tohear from him how his sister was doing at the opera, until two daysbefore, when he had learned from Lou herself what she had suffered atthe hands of Adrian Fellowes. That problem would now be settledforever; but there remained the question of Jigger, and that must besettled, whatever the other grave problems facing him. Jigger must becared for, must be placed in a position where he could have his startin life. Somehow Jigger was associated with all the movements of hislife now, and was taken as part of the problem. What to do? He thoughtof it as he went eastward, and it did not seem easy to settleit. Jigger himself, however, cut the Gordian knot.

When he was told that Stafford was going to South Africa, and that itwas a question as to what he--Jigger--should now do, in what sphereof life his abnormally "cute" mind must run, he answered, instantly.

Ian shook his head and smiled sadly. "I'm afraid that's not for you,Jigger. No, think again."

"Ain't there work in Souf Afriker--maybe not in the army itself, y'rgryce? Couldn't I have me chanct out there? Lou's all right now, Ibet; an' I could go as easy as can be."

"Yes, Lou will be all right now," remarked Stafford, with a reflectiveirony.

"I ain't got no stiddy job here, and there's work in Souf Afriker,ain't they? Couldn't I get a job holdin' horses, or carryin' a flag,or cleanin' the guns, or nippin' letters about--couldn't I, y'r gryce?I'm only askin' to go wiv you, to work, same as ever I did before Iwas run over. Ain't I goin' wiv you, y'r gryce?"

With a sudden resolve Stafford laid a hand on his shoulder. "Yes, youare going 'wiv' me, Jigger. You just are, horse, foot, andartillery. There'll be a job somewhere. I'll get you something to do,or--"

"Or bust, y'r gryce?"

So the problem lessened, and Ian's face cleared a little. If all thedifficulties perplexing his life would only clear like that! The babeand the suckling had found the way so simple, so natural; and it was acomforting way, for he had a deep and tender regard for this quaint,clever waif who had drifted across his path.

To-morrow he would come and fetch Jigger: and Jigger's face followedhim into the coming dusk, radiant and hopeful and full of life--oflife that mattered. Jigger would go out to "Souf Afriker" with all hislife before him, but he, Ian Stafford, would go with all his lifebehind him, all mile-stones passed except one.

So, brooding, he walked till he came to an underground station, andthere took a train to Charing Cross. Here he was only a littledistance away from the Embankment, where was to be found AdrianFellowes; and with bent head he made his way among the motley crowd infront of the station, scarcely noticing any one, yet resenting thejostle and the crush. Suddenly in the crowd in front of him he sawKrool stealing along with a wide-awake hat well down over hiseyes. Presently the sinister figure was lost in the confusion. It didnot occur to him that perhaps Krool might be making for the samedestination as himself; but the sight of the man threw his mind intoan eddy of torturing thoughts.

The flare of light, white and ghastly, at Charing Cross was shining ona moving mass of people, so many of whom were ghastly also--derelictsof humanity, ruins of womanhood, casuals, adventurers, scavengers oflife, prowlers who lived upon chance, upon cards, upon theft, uponwomen, upon libertines who waited in these precincts for some foolishand innocent woman whom they could entrap. Among them moved also thethousand other good citizens bent upon catching trains or wendingtheir way home from work; but in the garish, cruel light, all, eventhe good, looked evil in a way, and furtive and unstable. To-night,the crowd were far more restless than usual, far more irritating intheir purposeless movements. People sauntered, jerked themselvesforward, moved in and out, as it were, intent on going everywhere andnowhere; and the excitement possessing them, the agitation in the air,made them seem still more exasperating, and bewildering. Newsboys withshrill voices rasped the air with invitations to buy, and everywhereeager, nervous hands held out their half-pennies for the flimsysensational rags.

Presently a girl jostled Stafford, then apologized with an endearingword which brought a sick sensation to his brain; but he only shookhis head gravely at her. After all, she had a hard trade and it lednowhere--nowhere.

"Coming home with me, darling?" she added in response to hismeditative look. Anything that was not actual rebuff was invitation toher blunted sense. "Coming home with me--?"

Home! A wave of black cynicism, of sardonic mirth passed throughStafford's brain. Home--where the business of this poor wayfarer'sexistence was carried on, where the shopkeeper sold her wares in theinner sanctuary! Home.... He shook the girl's hand from his elbow andhastened on.

Yet why should he be angered with her, he said to himself. It was notmoral elevation which had made him rough with her, but only that wordHome she used.... The dire mockery of it burned his mind like acorrosive acid. He had had no home since his father died yearsago,--his mother had died when he was very young--and his eldestbrother had taken possession of the family mansions, placing them inthe control of his foreign wife, who sat in his mother's chair and inher place at table.

He had wished so often in the past for a home of his own, where hecould gather round him young faces and lose himself in promoting theinterests of those for whom he had become forever responsible. He hadlonged for the Englishman's castle, for his own little realm ofinterest where he could be supreme; and now it was never to be.

The idea gained in sacred importance as it receded forever from allpossibility. In far-off days it had been associated with a vision inblue, with a face like a dresden-china shepherdess and hair likeAphrodite's. Laughter and wit and raillery had been part of thepicture; and long evenings in the winter-time, when they two wouldread the books they both loved, and maybe talk awhile of world eventsin which his work had place; in which his gifts were found, shaping,influencing, producing. The garden, the orchard--he lovedorchards--the hedges of flowering ivy and lilacs; and the fine greyand chestnut horses driven by his hand or hers through country lanes;the smell of the fallen leaves in the autumn evenings; or the sting ofthe bracing January wind across the moors or where the woodcockawaited its spoiler. All these had been in the vision. It was all overnow. He had seen an image, it had vanished, and he was in the desertalone.

A band was playing "The Banks o' Garry Owen," and the tramp ofmarching men came to his ears. The crowd surged round him, pushed him,forced him forward, carried him on, till the marching men came near,were alongside of him--a battalion of Volunteers, going to the war tosee "Kruger's farmers bite the dust!"--a six months' excursion, asthey thought. Then the crowd, as it cheered jostled him against thewall of the shops, and presently he found himself forced downBuckingham Street. It was where he wished to go in order to reachAdrian Fellowes' apartments. He did not notice, as he was practicallythrown into the street, that Krool was almost beside him.

The street was not well lighted, and he looked neither to right norleft. He was thinking hard of what he would say to Adrian Fellowes,if, and when, he saw him.

But not far behind him was a figure that stole along in the darkershadows of the houses, keeping at some distance. The same figurefollowed him furtively till he came into that part of the Embankmentwhere Adrian Fellowes' chambers were; then it fell behind a little,for here the lights were brighter. It hung in the shadow of a door-wayand watched him as he approached the door of the big building whereAdrian Fellowes lived.

Presently, as he came nearer, Stafford saw a hansom standing beforethe door. Something made him pause for a moment, and when, in thepause, the figure of a woman emerged from the entrance and hastily gotinto the hansom, he drew back into the darkness of a doorway, as theman did who was now shadowing him; and he waited till it turned roundand rolled swiftly away. Then he moved forward again. When not farfrom the entrance, however, another cab--a four-wheeler--dischargedits occupant at a point nearer to the building than where hewaited. It was a woman. She paid the cabman, who touched his hat withquick and grateful emphasis, and, wheeling his old crock round,clattered away. The woman glanced along the empty street swiftly, andthen hurried to the doorway which opened to Adrian Fellowes' chambers.

Instantly Stafford recognized her. It was Jasmine, dressed in blackand heavily veiled. He could not mistake the figure--there was noneother like it; or the turn of her head--there was only one such headin all England. She entered the building quickly.

There was nothing to do but wait until she came out again. No passionstirred in him, no jealousy, no anger. It was all dead. He knew whyshe had come; or he thought he knew. She would tell the man who hadsaid no word in defense of her, done nothing to protect her, who letthe worst be believed, without one protest of her innocence, what shethought of him. She was foolish to go to him, but women do mad things,and they must not be expected to do the obviously sensible thing whenthe crisis of their lives has come. Stafford understood it all.

One thing he was certain Jasmine did not know--the intimacy betweenFellowes and Al'mah. He himself had been tempted to speak of it intheir terrible interview that morning; but he had refrained. Theignominy, the shame, the humiliation of that would have been beyondher endurance. He understood; but he shrank at the thought of thenature of the interview which she must have, at the thought of themeeting at all.

He would have some time to wait, no doubt, and he made himself easy inthe doorway, where his glance could command the entrance she hadused. He mechanically took out a cigar-case, but after looking at thecigars for a moment put them away again with a sigh. Smoking would notsoothe him. He had passed beyond the artificial.

His waiting suddenly ended. It seemed hardly three minutes afterJasmine's entrance when she appeared in the doorway again, and, aftera hasty glance up and down the street, sped away as swiftly as shecould, and, at the corner, turned up sharply towards the Strand. Hermovements had been agitated, and, as she hurried on, she thrust herhead down into her muff as a woman would who faced a blinding rain.

The interview had been indeed short. Perhaps Fellowes had already goneabroad. He would soon find out.

He mounted the deserted staircase quickly and knocked at Fellowes'door. There was no reply. There was a light, however, and he knockedagain. Still there was no answer. He tried the handle of the door. Itturned, the door gave, and he entered. There was no sound. He knockedat an inner door. There was no reply, yet a light showed in theroom. He turned the handle. Entering the room, he stood still andlooked round. It seemed empty, but there were signs of packing, ofthings gathered together hastily.

Then, with a strange sudden sense of a presence in the room, he lookedround again. There in a far corner of the large room was a couch, andon it lay a figure--Adrian Fellowes, straight and still--and sleeping.

Stafford went over. "Fellowes," he said, sharply.

There was no reply. He leaned over and touched a shoulder. "Fellowes!"he exclaimed again, but something in the touch made him look closelyat the face half turned to the wall. Then he knew.

Adrian Fellowes was dead.

Horror came upon Stafford, but no cry escaped him. He stooped oncemore and closely looked at the body, but without touching it. Therewas no sign of violence, no blood, no disfigurement, no distortion,only a look of sleep--a pale, motionless sleep.

But the body was warm yet. He realized that as his hand had touchedthe shoulder. The man could only have been dead a little while.

Only a little while: and in that little while Jasmine had left thehouse with agitated footsteps.

"He did not die by his own hand," Stafford said aloud.

He rang the bell loudly. No one answered. He rang and rang again, andthen a lazy porter came.

CHAPTER XXIII

"MORE WAS LOST AT MOHACKSFIELD"

Eastminster House was ablaze. A large dinner had been fixed for thisOctober evening, and only just before half-past eight Jasmine enteredthe drawing-room to receive her guests. She had completely forgottenthe dinner till very late in the afternoon, when she observedpreparations for which she had given instructions the day before. Shewas about to leave the house upon the mission which had drawn herfootsteps in the same direction as those of Ian Stafford, when thebutler came to her for information upon some details. These she gavewith an instant decision which was part of her equipment, and then,when the butler had gone, she left the house on foot to take a cab atthe corner of Piccadilly.

When she returned home, the tables in the dining-room were decorated,the great rooms were already lighted, and the red carpet was beinglaid down at the door. The footmen looked up with surprise as she cameup the steps, and their eyes followed her as she ascended thestaircase with marked deliberation.

"Well, that's style for you," said the first footman. "Takin' anairin' on shanks' hosses."

"And a quarter of an hour left to put on the tirara," sniggered thesecond footman. "The lot is asked for eight-thirty."

"Swells, the bunch, windin' up with the brother of anEmperor--'struth!"

"What price a title for the Byng Baas one of these days! They liketips down there where the old Markis rumbles through his beard--and alot of hands to be greased. And grease it costs a lot, politicalgrease does. But what price a title--Sir Rudyard Byng, Bart., wot oh!"

"Try another shelf higher up, and it's more like it. Wot a head for acoronet 'ers! W'y--"

But the voice of the butler recalled them from the fields ofimagination, and they went with lordly leisure upon the business ofthe household.

Socially this was to be the day of Jasmine's greatest triumph. One ofthe British royal family was, with the member of another greatreigning family, honouring her table--though the ladies of neitherwere to be present; and this had been a drop of chagrin in hercup. She had been unaware of the gossip there had been oflate,--though it was unlikely the great ladies would have known ofit--and she would have been slow to believe what Ian had told her thisday, that men had talked lightly of her at De Lancy Scovel'shouse. Her eyes had been shut; her wilful nature had not beensensitive to the quality of the social air about her. Peoplecame--almost "everybody" came--to her house, and would come, ofcourse, until there was some open scandal; until her husbandintervened. Yet everybody did not come. The royal princesses had notfound it convenient to come; and this may have meant nothing, or verymuch indeed. To Jasmine, however, as she hastily robed herself fordinner, her mind working with lightning swiftness, it did not matterat all; if all the kings and queens of all the world had promised tocome and had not come, it would have meant nothing to her this nightof nights.

In her eyes there was the look of one who has seen some horriblething, though she gave her orders with coherence and decision asusual, and with great deftness she assisted her maid in the hastytoilette. Her face was very pale, save for one or two hectic spotswhich took the place of the nectarine bloom so seldom absent from hercheeks, and in its place was a new, shining, strange look like a mostdelicate film--the transfiguring kind of look which great joy or greatpain gives.

Coming up the staircase from the street, she had seen Krool enter herhusband's room more hastily than usual, and had heard him greetedsharply--something that sounded strange to her ears, for Rudyard wasuniformly kind to Krool. Never had Rudyard's voice sounded as it didnow. Of course it was her imagination, but it was like a voice whichcame from some desolate place, distant, arid and alien. That was notthe voice in which he had wooed her on the day when they heard ofJameson's Raid. That was not the voice which had spoken to her inbroken tones of love on the day Ian first dined with her after hermarriage--that fateful, desperate day. This was a voice which had acheerless, fretful note, a savage something in it. Presently they twowould meet, and she knew how it would be--an outward semblance, asuperficial amenity and confidence before their guests; the smile ofintimacy, when there was no intimacy, and never, never, could beagain; only acting, only make-believe, only the artifice of deceit.

Yet when she was dressed--in pure white, with only a string of pearls,the smallest she had, round her neck--she was like that white flowerwhich had been placed on her pillow last night.

Turning to leave the bedroom she caught sight of her face and figureagain in the big mirror, and she seemed to herself like some otherwoman. There was that strange, distant look of agony in her eyes, thattransfiguring look in the face; there was the figure somehow goneslimmer in these few hours; and there was a frail appearance which didnot belong to her.

As she was about to leave the room to descend the stairs, there came aknock at the door. A bunch of white violets was handed in, with apencilled note in Rudyard's handwriting.

White violets--white violets!

The note read, "Wear these to-night, Jasmine."

White violets--how strange that he should send them! These they sendfor the young, the innocent, and the dead. Rudyard had sent them toher--from how far away! He was there just across the hallway, and yethe might have been in Bolivia, so far as their real life wasconcerned.

She was under no illusion. This day, and perhaps a few, a very fewothers, must be lived under the same roof, in order that they couldseparate without scandal; but things could never go on as in thepast. She had realized that the night before, when still that chanceof which she had spoken to Stafford was hers; when she had wound thecoil of her wonderful hair round her throat, and had imagined thatself-destruction which has tempted so many of more spiritual make thanherself. It was melodramatic, emotional, theatrical, maybe; but theemotional, the theatrical, the egotistic mortal has his or hertragedy, which is just as real as that which comes to those of morespiritual vein, just as real as that which comes to the more classicalvictim of fate. Jasmine had the deep defects of her qualities. Hersuffering was not the less acute because it found its way out withimpassioned demonstration.

There was, however, no melodrama in the quiet trembling with which shetook the white violets, the symbol of love and death. She was surethat Rudyard was not aware of their significance and meaning, but thatdid not modify the effect upon her. Her trouble just now was too deepfor tears, too bitter for words, too terrible for aught save numbendurance. Nothing seemed to matter in a sense, and yet the littleroutine of life meant so much in its iron insistence. The habits ofconvention are so powerful that life's great issues are often obscuredby them. Going to her final doom a woman would stop to give the lastcareful touch to her hair--the mechanical obedience to long habit. Itis not vanity, not littleness, but habit; never shown with subtlerirony than in the case of Madame de Langrois, who, pacing the path toher execution at Lille, stooped, picked up a pin from the ground, andfastened it in her gown--the tyranny of habit.

Outside her own room Jasmine paused for a moment and looked at theclosed door of Rudyard's room. Only a step--and yet she was kept apartfrom him by a shadow so black, so overwhelming, that she could notpenetrate it. It smothered her sight. No, no, that little step couldnot be taken; there was a gulf between them which could not bebridged.

There was nothing to say to Rudyard except what could be said upon thesurface, before all the world, as it were; things which must be saidthrough an atmosphere of artificial sounds, which would give noresponse to the agonized cries of the sentient soul. She could makebelieve before the world, but not alone with Rudyard. She shrankwithin herself at the idea of being alone with him.

As she went down-stairs a scene in a room on the Thames Embankment,from which she had come a half hour ago, passed before her vision. Itwas as though it had been imprinted on the film of her eye and muststay there forever.

When would the world know that Adrian Fellowes lay dead in the room onthe Embankment? And when they knew it, what would they say? They wouldask how he died--the world would ask how he died. The Law would askhow he died.

How had he died? Who killed him? Or did he die by his own hand? HadAdrian Fellowes, the rank materialist, the bon viveur, the man-luxury,the courage to kill himself by his own hand? If not, who killed him?She shuddered. They might say that she killed him.

She had seen no one on the staircase as she had gone up, but she haddimly seen another figure outside in the terrace as she came out, andthere was the cabman who drove her to the place. That was all.

Now, entering the great drawing-room of her own house she shuddered asthough from an icy chill. The scene there on the Embankment--her ownbitter anger, her frozen hatred; then the dead man with his faceturned to the wall; the stillness, the clock ticking, her own coldvoice speaking to him, calling; then the terrified scrutiny, the touchof the wrist, the realization, the moment's awful horror, the silencewhich grew more profound, the sudden paralysis of body andwill.... And then--music, strange, soft, mysterious music coming fromsomewhere inside the room, music familiar and yet unnatural, a songshe had heard once before, a pathetic folk-song of eastern Europe,"More Was Lost at Mohacksfield." It was a tale of love and loss andtragedy and despair.

Startled and overcome, she had swayed, and would have fallen, but thatwith an effort of the will she had caught at the table and savedherself. With the music still creeping in unutterable melancholythrough the room, she had fled, closing the door behind her verysoftly as though not to disturb the sleeper. It had followed her downthe staircase and into the street, the weird, unnatural music.

It was only when she had entered a cab in the Strand that she realizedexactly what the music was. She remembered that Fellowes had bought amusic-box which could be timed to play at will--even days ahead, andhe had evidently set the box to play at this hour. It did so, astrange, grim commentary on the stark thing lying on the couch,nerveless as though it had been dead a thousand years. It had ceasedto play before Stafford entered the room, but, strangely enough, itbegan again as he said over the dead body, "He did not die by his ownhand."

Standing before the fireplace in the drawing-room, awaiting the firstguest, Jasmine said to herself: "No, no, he had not the courage tokill himself."

Some one had killed him. Who was it? Who killedhim--Rudyard--Ian--who? But how? There was no sign of violence. Thatmuch she had seen. He lay like one asleep. Who was it killed him?

"Lady Tynemouth."

Back to the world from purgatory again. The butler's voice broke thespell, and Lady Tynemouth took her friend in her arms and kissed her.

"So handsome you look, my darling--and all in white. White violets,too. Dear, dear, how sweet, and oh, how triste! But I suppose it'schic. Certainly, it is stunning. And so simple. Just the weeny, teenystring of pearls, like a young under-secretary's wife, to show whatshe might do if she had a fair chance. Oh, you clever, wonderfulJasmine!"

"My dressmaker says I have no real taste in colours, so Icompromised," was Jasmine's reply, with a really good imitation of asmile.

As she babbled on, Lady Tynemouth had been eyeing her friend withswift inquiry, for she had never seen Jasmine look as she didto-night, so ethereal, so tragically ethereal, with dark lines underthe eyes, the curious transparency of the skin, and the feverishbrightness and far-awayness of the look. She was about to saysomething in comment, but other guests entered, and it wasimpossible. She watched, however, from a little distance, whiletalking gaily to other guests; she watched at the dinner-table, asJasmine, seated between her two royalties, talked with gaiety, withpretty irony, with respectful badinage; and no one could be so daringwith such ceremonious respect at the same time as she. Yet through itall Lady Tynemouth saw her glance many times with a strange, strainedinquiry at Rudyard, seated far away opposite her; at another big,round table.

"There's something wrong here," Lady Tynemouth said to herself, andwondered why Ian Stafford was not present. Mennaval was there, eagerlyseeking glances. These Jasmine gave with a smiling openness andapparent good-fellowship, which were not in the least compromising.Lady Tynemouth saw Mennaval's vain efforts, and laughed to herself,and presently she even laughed with her neighbour about them.

"What an infant it is!" she said to her table companion. "Jasmine Byngdoesn't care a snap of her finger about Mennaval."

"Does she care a snap for anybody?" asked the other. Then he added,with a kind of query in the question apart from the question itself:"Where is the great man--where's Stafford to-night?"

"Counting his winnings, I suppose." Lady Tynemouth's face grewsoft. "He has done great things for so young a man. What a distance hehas gone since he pulled me and my red umbrella back from the ZambesiFalls!"

Then proceeded a gay conversation, in which Lady Tynemouth was quitehappy. When she could talk of Ian Stafford she was really enjoyingherself. In her eyes he was the perfect man, whom other women tried tospoil, and whom, she flattered herself, she kept sound and unspoiledby her frank platonic affection.

"Our host seems a bit abstracted to-night," said her table companionafter a long discussion about what Stafford had done and what he stillmight do.

"The war--it means so much to him," said Lady Tynemouth. Yet she hadseen the note of abstraction too, and it had made her wonder what washappening in this household.

The other demurred.

"But I imagine he has been prepared for the war for some time. Hedidn't seem excessively worried about it before dinner, yet he seemedupset too, so pale and anxious-looking."

"I'll make her talk, make her tell me what it is, if there isanything," said Lady Tynemouth to herself. "I'll ask myself to staywith her for a couple of days."

Superficial as Lady Tynemouth seemed to many, she had real sincerity,and she was a friend in need to her friends. She loved Jasmine as muchas she could love any woman, and she said now, as she looked atJasmine's face, so alert, so full of raillery, yet with such anundertone of misery:

"She looks as if she needed a friend."

After dinner she contrived to get her arm through that of her hostess,and gave it an endearing pressure. "May I come to you for a few days,Jasmine?" she asked.

"I was going to ask if you would have me," answered Jasmine, with aqueer little smile. "Rudyard will be up to his ears for a few days,and that's a chance for you and me to do some shopping, and some otherthings together, isn't it?"

She was thinking of appearances, of the best way to separate fromRudyard for a little while, till the longer separation could bearranged without scandal. Ian Stafford had said that things could goon in this house as before, that Rudyard would never hint to her whathe knew, or rather what the letter had told him or left untold: butthat was impossible. Whatever Rudyard was willing to do, there wasthat which she could not do. Twenty-four hours had accomplished acomplete revolution in her attitude towards life and in her sense ofthings. Just for these immediate days to come, when the tragedy ofFellowes' death would be made a sensation of the hour, there must betemporary expedients; and Lady Tynemouth had suggested one which hadits great advantages.

She could not bear to remain in Rudyard's house; and in his heart ofhearts Rudyard would wish the same, even if he believed her innocent;but if she must stay for appearance' sake, then it would be good tohave Lady Tynemouth with her. Rudyard would be grateful for time toget his balance again. This bunch of violets was the impulse of a big,magnanimous nature; but it would be followed by the inevitablereaction, which would be the real test and trial.

Love and forgiveness--what had she to do with either! She did not wishforgiveness because of Adrian Fellowes. No heart had been involved inthat episode. It had in one sense meant nothing to her. She lovedanother man, and she did not wish forgiveness of him either. No, no,the whole situation was impossible. She could not stay here. For hisown sake Rudyard would not, ought not, to wish her to stay. What mightthe next few days bring forth?

Who had killed Adrian Fellowes? He was not man enough to take his ownlife--who had killed him? Was it her husband, after all? He had saidto Ian Stafford that he would do nothing, but, with the maggot ofrevenge and jealousy in their brains, men could not be trusted fromone moment to another.

The white violets? Even they might be only the impulse of the moment,one of those acts of madness of jealous and revengeful people. Men hadkissed their wives and then killed them--fondled them, and thenstrangled them. Rudyard might have made up his mind since morning tokill Fellowes, and kill herself, also. Fellowes was gone, and nowmight come her turn. White violets were the flowers of death, and thefirst flowers he had ever given her were purple violets, the flowersof life and love.

If Rudyard had killed Adrian Fellowes, there would be an end toeverything. If he was suspected, and if the law stretched out its handof steel to clutch him--what an ignominious end to it all; what a meanfinish to life, to opportunity, to everything worth doing!

And she would have been the cause of everything.

The thought scorched her soul.

Yet she talked on gaily to her guests until the men returned fromtheir cigars; as though Penalty and Nemesis were outside even therange of her imagination; as though she could not hear the snap of thehandcuffs on Rudyard's--or Ian's--wrists.

Before and after dinner only a few words had passed between her andRudyard, and that was with people round them. It was as though theyspoke through some neutralizing medium, in which all real personalrelation was lost. Now Rudyard came to her, however, and in amatter-of-fact voice said: "I suppose Al'mah will be here. You haven'theard to the contrary, I hope? These great singers are so whimsical."

There was no time for Jasmine to answer, for through one of the farentrances of the drawing-room Al'mah entered. Her manner wascomposed--if possible more composed than usual, and she looked aroundher calmly. At that moment a servant handed Byng a letter. Itcontained only a few words, and it ran:

"DEAR BYNG,--Fellowes is gone. I found him dead in his rooms. Aninquest will be held to-morrow. There are no signs of violence;neither of suicide or anything else. If you want me, I shall be at myrooms after ten o'clock to-night. I have got all his papers." Yoursever,

"IAN STAFFORD."

Jasmine watched Rudyard closely as he read. A strange look passed overhis face, but his hand was steady as he put the note in hispocket. She then saw him look searchingly at Al'mah as he went forwardto greet her.

On the instant Rudyard had made up his mind what to do. It was clearthat Al'mah did not know that Fellowes was dead, or she would not behere; for he knew of their relations, though he had never toldJasmine. Jasmine did not suspect the truth, or Al'mah would not bewhere she was; and Fellowes would never have written to Jasmine theletter for which he had paid with his life.

Al'mah was gently appreciative of the welcome she received from bothByng and Jasmine, and she prepared to sing.

"Yes, I think I am in good voice," she said to Jasmine,presently. Then Rudyard went, giving his wife's arm a little familiartouch as he passed, and said:

"Remember, we must have some patriotic things tonight. I'm sure Al'mahwill feel so, too. Something really patriotic and stirring. We shallneed it--yes we shall need cheering very badly before we'vedone. We're not going to have a walk-over in South Africa. Cheering upis what we want, and we must have it."

Again he cast a queer, inquiring look at Al'mah, to which he got noresponse, and to himself he said, grimly: "Well, it's better sheshould not know it--here."

His mind was in a maze. He moved as in a dream. He was pale, but hehad an air of determination. Once he staggered with dizziness, then herighted himself and smiled at some one near. That some one winked athis neighbour.

"It's true, then, what we hear about him," the neighbour said, andsuggestively raised fingers to his mouth.

Al'mah sang as perhaps she had seldom sung. There was in her voice anabandon and tragic intensity, a wonderful resonance and power, whichcaptured her hearers as they had never been captured before. First shesang a love-song, then a song of parting. Afterwards came a lyric ofcountry, which stirred her audience deeply. It was a challenge toevery patriot to play his part for home and country. It was an appealto the spirit of sacrifice; it was an inspiration and aninvocation. Men's eyes grew moist.

And now another, a final song, a combination of all--of love, and lossand parting and ruin, and war and patriotism and destiny. With thefirst low notes of it Jasmine rose slowly from her seat, like one in adream, and stood staring blindly at Al'mah. The great voice swelledout in a passion of agony, then sank away into a note of despair thatgripped the heart.

"But more was lost at Mohacksfield--"

Jasmine had stood transfixed while the first words were sung, then, asthe last line was reached, staring straight in front of her, as thoughshe saw again the body of Adrian Fellowes in the room by the river,she gave a cry, which sounded half laughter and half torture, and fellheavily on the polished floor.

Rudyard ran forward and lifted her in his arms. Lady Tynemouth wasbeside him in an instant.

"Yes, that's right--you come," he said to her, and he carried the limpbody up-stairs, the white violets in her dress crushed against hisbreast.

"Poor child--the war, of course; it means so much to them."

Thus, a kindly dowager, as she followed the Royalties down-stairs.

CHAPTER XXIV

ONE WHO CAME SEARCHING

"A lady to see you, sir."

"A lady? What should we be doing with ladies here, Gleg?"

"I'm sure I have no use for them, sir," replied Gleg, sourly. He wasin no good humour. That very morning he had been told that his masterwas going to South Africa, and that he would not be needed there, butthat he should remain in England, drawing his usual pay. Instead ofreceiving this statement with gratitude, Gleg had sniffed in a mannerwhich, in any one else, would have been impertinence; and he had noteven offered thanks.

"Well, what do you think she wants? She looks respectable?"

"I don't know about that, sir. It's her ladyship, sir."

"It's what 'ladyship,' Gleg?"

"Her ladyship, sir--Lady Tynemouth."

Stafford looked at Gleg meditatively for a minute, and then saidquietly:

"Let me see, you have been with me sixteen years, Gleg. You'veforgotten me often enough in that time, but you've never forgottenyourself before. Come to me to-morrow at noon.... I shall allow you asmall pension. Show her ladyship in."

Gone waxen in face, Gleg crept out of the room.

"Seven-and-six a week, I suppose," he said to himself as he went downthe stairs. "Seven-and-six for a bit of bonhommy."

With great consideration he brought Lady Tynemouth up, and shut thedoor with that stillness which might be reverence, or something at itsantipodes.

Lady Tynemouth smiled cheerily at Ian as she held out her hand.

"Gleg disapproves of me very greatly. He thinks I am no better than Iought to be."

"I am sure you are," answered Stafford, drily.

"Well, if you don't know, Ian, who does? I've put my head in thelion's mouth before, just like this, and the lion hasn't snappedonce," she rejoined, settling herself cozily in a great, greenleather-chair. "Nobody would believe it; but there it is. The worldcouldn't think that you could be so careless of your opportunities, orthat I would pay for the candle without burning it."

"On the contrary, I think they would believe anything you told them."

She laughed happily. "Wouldn't you like to call me Alice, 'same asever,' in the days of long ago? It would make me feel at home afterGleg's icy welcome."

He smiled, looked down at her with admiration, and quoted some linesof Swinburne, alive with cynicism:

"And the worst and the best of this is,That neither is most to blameIf she has forgotten my kisses,And I have forgotten her name."

Lady Tynemouth made a plaintive gesture. "I should probably be ableto endure the bleak present, if there had been any kisses in the sunnypast," she rejoined, with mock pathos. "That's the worst of ourfriendship, Ian. I'm quite sure the world thinks I'm one of your spentflames, and there never was any fire, not so big as the point of aneedle, was there? It's that which hurts so now, little IanStafford--not so much fire as would burn on the point of a needle."

"'On the point of a needle,'" Ian repeated, half-abstractedly. He wentover to his writing-desk, and, opening a blotter, regarded itmeditatively for an instant. As he did so she tapped the floorimpatiently with her umbrella, and looked at him curiously, but with alittle quirk of humour at the corners of her mouth.

"The point of a needle might carry enough fire to burn up a gooddeal," he said, reflectively. Then he added, slowly: "Do you rememberMr. Mappin and his poisoned needle at Glencader?"

"Yes, of course. That was a day of tragedy, when you and Rudyard Byngwon a hundred Royal Humane Society medals, and we all felt likemartyrs and heroes. I had the most creepy dreams afterwards. One nightit was awful. I was being tortured with Mr. Mappin's needle horriblyby--guess whom? By that half-caste Krool, and I waked up with alittle scream, to find Tynie busy pinching me. I had been making sucha wurra-wurra, as he called it."

"Well, it is a startling idea that there's poison powerful enough tomake a needle-point dipped in it deadly."

"I don't believe it a bit, but--"

Pausing, she flicked a speck of fluff from her black dress--she wasall in black, with only a stole of pure white about hershoulders. "But tell me," she added, presently--"for it's one of thereasons why I'm here now--what happened at the inquest to-day? Theevening papers are not out, and you were there, of course, and gaveevidence, I suppose. Was it very trying? I'm sure it was, for I'venever seen you look so pale. You are positively haggard, Ian. Youdon't mind that from an old friend, do you? You look terribly ill,just when you should look so well."

"Why should I look so well?" He gazed at her steadily. Had she anyglimmering of the real situation? She was staying now in Byng's house,and two days had gone since the world had gone wrong; since Jasminehad sunk to the floor unconscious as Al'mah sang, "More was lost atMohacksfield."

"Why should you look so well? Because you are the coming man, theysay. It makes me so proud to be your friend--even your neglected, ifnot quite discarded, friend. Every one says you have done suchsplendid work for England, and that now you can have anything youwant. The ball is at your feet. Dear man, you ought to look like amorning-glory, and not as you do. Tell me, Ian, are you ill, or is itonly the reaction after all you've done?"

"No doubt it's the reaction," he replied.

"I know you didn't like Adrian Fellowes much," she remarked, watchinghim closely. "He behaved shockingly at the Glencader Mineaffair--shockingly. Tynie was for pitching him out of the house, andtaking the consequences; but, all the same, a sudden death like thatall alone must have been dreadful. Please tell me, what was theverdict?"

"Heart failure was the verdict; with regret for a promising life cutshort, and sympathy with the relatives."

"I never heard that he had heart trouble," was the meditativeresponse. "But--well, of course, it was heart failure. When the heartstops beating, there's heart failure. What a silly verdict!"

"It sounded rather worse than silly," was Ian's comment.

"Did--did they cut him up, to see if he'd taken morphia, or anoverdose of laudanum or veronal or something? I had a friend who diedof taking quantities of veronal while you were abroad so long--a SouthAmerican, she was."

He nodded. "It was all quite in order. There were no signs of poison,they said, but the heart had had a shock of some kind. There had beenwhat they called lesion, and all that kind of thing, and notsufficient strength for recovery."

"I suppose Mr. Mappin wasn't present?" she asked, curiously. "I knowit is silly in a way, but don't you remember how interestedMr. Fellowes was in that needle? Was Mr. Mappin there?"

"There was no reason why he should be there."

"What witnesses were called?"

"Myself and the porter of Fellowes' apartments, his banker, hisdoctor--"

"And Al'mah?" she asked, obliquely.

He did not reply at once, but regarded her inquiringly.

"You needn't be afraid to speak about Al'mah," she continued. "I sawsomething queer at Glencader. Then I asked Tynie, and he told methat--well, all about her and Adrian Fellowes. Was Al'mah there? Didshe give evidence?"

"She was there to be called, if necessary," he responded, "but thecoroner was very good about it. After the autopsy the authorities saidevidence was unnecessary, and--"

"You arranged that, probably?"

"Yes; it was not difficult. They were so stupid--and so kind."

She smoothed out the folds of her dress reflectively, then got up asif with sudden determination, and came near to him. Her face was palenow, and her eyes were greatly troubled.

"Ian," she said, in a low voice, "I don't believe that Adrian Fellowesdied a natural death, and I don't believe that he killed himself. Hewould not have that kind of courage, even in insanity. He could nevergo insane. He could never care enough about anything to doso. He--did--not--kill--himself. There, I am sure of it. And he didnot die a natural death, either."

She put her hand to her eyes for a moment. "Oh, it all seems sohorrible! I've tried to shake it off, and not to think my thoughts,and I came to you to get fresh confidence; but as soon as I saw yourface I knew I couldn't have it. I know you are upset too, perhaps notby the same thoughts, but through the same people."

"Tell me all you think or know. Be quite frank," he said, heavily. "Iwill tell you why later. It is essential that you should be whollyfrank with me."

"As I have always been. I can't be anything else. Anyhow, I owe you somuch that you have the right to ask me what you will.... There it is,the fatal thing," she added.

Her eyes were raised to the red umbrella which had nearly carried herover into the cauldron of the Zambesi Falls.

"No, it is the world that owes me a heavy debt," he responded,gallantly. "I was merely selfish in saving you."

Her eyes filled with tears, which she brushed away with a littlelaugh.

"Ah, how I wish it was that! I am just mean enough to want you to wantme, while I didn't want you. That's the woman, and that's all women,and there's no getting away from it. But still I would rather you hadsaved me than any one else who wasn't bound, like Tynie, to do so."

"Well, it did seem absurd that you should risk so much to keep asixpenny umbrella," he rejoined, drily.

"How we play on the surface while there's so much that is wearing ourhearts out underneath," she responded, wearily. "Listen, Ian, you knowwhat I mean. Whoever killed Adrian Fellowes, or didn't, I am sure thatJasmine saw him dead. Three nights ago when she fainted and went illto bed, I stayed with her, slept in the same room, in the bed besidehers. The opiate the doctor gave her was not strong enough, and two orthree times she half waked, and--and it was very painful. It made myheart ache, for I knew it wasn't all dreams. I am sure she saw AdrianFellowes lying dead in his room.... Ian, it is awful, but for somereason she hated him, and she saw him lying dead. If any one knows thetruth, you know. Jasmine cares for you--no, no, don't mind my sayingit. She didn't care a fig for Mennaval, or any of the others, but shedoes care for you--cares for you. She oughtn't to, but she does, andshe should have married you long ago before Rudyard Byng came. Pleasedon't think I am interfering, Ian. I am not. You never had a betterfriend than I am. But there's something ghastly wrong. Rudyard islooking like a giant that's had blood-letting, and he never goes nearJasmine, except when some one is with her. It's a bad sign when twopeople must have some third person about to insulate theirself-consciousness and prevent those fatal moments when they have tobe just their own selves, and have it out."

"You think there's been trouble between them?" His voice was quitesteady, his manner composed.

"I don't think quite that. But there is trouble in thatpalace. Rudyard is going to South Africa."